Tiryaqul-Qulub

Panacea of the Souls

Background

The Promised Messiah(as) was prompted to write this book when one his followers, Ilahi Bakhsh, an accountant, became a renegade, even though the Promised Messiah(as) had written a book, Daruratul-Imam to remove some of his doubts and misgivings. This man, with two of his friends, Munshi ‘Abdul Haq, a pensioner, and Hafiz Muhammad Yusuf of Irrigation Department, tried to whip up feelings against the Promised Messiah(as) by raising irrelevant issues. The Promised Messiah(as), therefore, wrote to him twice and the last letter was written on June 16, 1899, urging him to publish those prophecies which Ilahi Bakhsh had made about the Promised Messiah(as), and an Ishtihar about the prophecies should reach him by June 30, 1899, otherwise no further correspondence would be entertained. Ilahi Bakhsh wrote a letter to the Promised Messiah(as) in the first week of July in which he mentioned some of his prophecies against him. The Promised Messiah(as) started writing the book at the end of July 1899.

The Book

On August 1, 1899, the Promised Messiah(as) finished writing his book, Tiryaqul-Qulub. In this book, the Promised Messiah(as) asserted with all emphasis at his command that:

It is necessary that in this religion such people are born who are true successors of the Holy Prophet(sa) and prove that the Prophet is alive and well with all his spiritual blessings and he did not die and it is important to show that all spiritual blessings of his are living.1

The Promised Messiah(as) further declared:

God has granted me heavenly signs and there is no one who can compete with me in this field and there is no Christian in this world who can show a heavenly sign.2

Let a meeting be called, he suggested, for this purpose at Batala, Amritsar or Lahore. Such claimants should then pray along with the Promised Messiah(as) that God should grant within a year a magnificent and conspicuous sign to the one who was really true in the sight of God. The sign or miracle must be superhuman and supernatural. The notice of such a meeting should reach the Promised Messiah(as) within 10 days before the appointed date. It should not be a private letter. Let it be a printed, and a leaflet giving the date, time and place of the proposed meeting bearing the witness of 20 honourable men to show that the writer was really in earnest about the matter.

It should be remembered that the Promised Messiah(as)’s keenness on a heavenly sign was a necessary consequence of his belief in God. It is an essential feature of Islam that it presents God as a Living God. Greek philosophers and the Indian sages “conceive God as a being of static perfection abiding for ever in the fruition of His own blessedness but it is the Living God Whom Muslims worship. He has created all things and He creates afresh even now. He is not a mere mechanical kind of sovereign detached practically from the whole of the Universe. He has a dominion over everything and He controls all things. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without His command.”

God’s purpose and power is fully reflected and regulated which constitute the familiar natural order in such regularities, men of science observe the Laws of Nature which serve His purpose. But it does not mean that signs and miracle cannot and ought not to take place. Scientists have by no means claimed that they have exhausted the laws of nature, nor have they yet fully comprehended all the underlying principles which govern the complex universe around us. A miracle is not necessarily a breach of order, but it expresses the purpose of God, which also determines the order of nature. Therefore, there is nothing irrational or capricious in miracles.

It is not for man to say whether God should or should not interfere in the affairs of man or in the laws of nature. All that one can say is that reason requires that a Being Who creates, governs and controls the universe should be able to interfere whenever there arises a genuine occasion demanding His interference; and of this, He alone is the judge. The fact that He does sometime actually interfere or that He appears to do so, is incontestably borne out by history. Truthful witnesses have testified to it throughout the ages and human observation has recorded it throughout history.

The present is, however, a most skeptical world and some people go to the extreme of asserting that the writings in which miracles figure, are not “historical in the modern and scientific sense of the word.”

A Note About the Book

This book was printed at the Diya’ul-Islam Press and published on October, 1902. On page 9 of the introduction, a statement under oath given by Mirza Ismail Beg, says: “I printed Tiryaqul-Qulub but it remained unfinished, I printed the last page and title page in October 1902, that is how the printing was completed.”

Five supplements were added to it. In the first supplement, 279 names of non-Ahmadis were published who were ready to testify to the clear fulfilment of the Promised Messiah(as)’s prophecy about Pandit Lekh Ram. The second supplement contained an account of 75 prophecies which the Promised Messiah(as) had made and which had been fulfilled in every respect. It was this supplement which delayed the publication of the book. The third supplement was a leaflet dated September 27, 1899, and the fourth was another leaflet dated October 22, 1899. In the last supplement, he published his own revelation, which he had on September 14, 1899, to the effect that a great sign would be granted to him. This revelation and three other similar ones received in these days were beautifully written and hung on a wall of “Baitul Dhikr” on September 16, 1899. The fifth supplement dated November 5, 1899 carried a prayer and a request to God that He might grant the Promised Messiah(as) a decisive sign within three years from January 1900 to December 1902, so that the truth of his mission might become manifest to the world.

Before closing the book, the Promised Messiah(as) made a significant observation. Recalling the two dynamic facets of the Holy Prophet(sa) denoted by the names of “Muhammad” and “Ahmad,” he stated that the name “Muhammad” speaks of the might and prowess as he repelled the enemies who attacked Islam with sword. “Ahmad,” on the other hand, denotes that facet of the Holy Prophet(sa) wherein he is known to have spread peace and amity, and these qualities will be apparent when another person will appear with the same characteristics.

The Promised Messiah(as) has stated:

Therefore, I have decided that my followers be known as Firqah Muslim Ahmadiyya, so that the moment they hear the name Ahmad, they will come to believe that this is the Firqah (sect) which has come to spread peace and amity. Therefore, I urge the Government to enter into the official records the name of Muslim Firqah Ahmadiyya (Ahmadi Muslim) in order to identify my followers….

He chose the name of Ahmadi in order to reflect the attributive qualities of the Holy Prophet(sa) manifested in the name of Ahmad.3